Developer Update 2016.11.21

It's been a while since my last update. I'd like to bring you all up to date on what's been going on and what’s in the works!

First off, several players have expressed their concern to me regarding the recent slowdown in new players. Most new players these days come from Steam. Unfortunately, several months ago Steam changed several systems, negatively impacting traffic to our store page.

One change is how ratings are calculated. Prior to the changes, all reviews counted towards our overall rating on Steam. Now, only reviews from customers that bought Xsyon through Steam count towards the overall rating. Ratings from players that obtained a Steam key do not count. As many of our players obtained Steam keys, this is not a good change for Xsyon.

Another change is how reviews are displayed. Reviews are shown in an order based on several factors including helpful rating, amount of ratings and date posted. In the past, older reviews were given less prominence as they tend to contain outdated information. Currently several old reviews complaining about Xsyon’s subscription, which was removed a year ago, are being prominently displayed, misleading potential new players.

In the past I've released game updates as they're ready. This has resulted in active periods often followed by slow periods while I work on and test the next round of improvements. Unfortunately it’s been difficult to keep a solid influx of new and returning players this way.

This year I’ve been working with a different approach. While I’ve released bug fixes, optimizations and minor changes, I’ve been saving up major features and improvements until I have many ready to go. With a series of important updates released on a regular monthly basis, I hope to build and keep a steady momentum to attract new players and entice past players to return to an active world of Xsyon.

The upcoming series of updates will include:

Continued heavy optimizations

Revised position and action synchronization

Creature AI revisions

Creature stat revisions

Creature path finding revised

Combat revisions

Animal Taming

Pets

Mounts

Artisan and Master weapons

Two handed weapons

Weapon bonuses revised

40-50 Improvements based on Player Suggestions including a Party system

War Server territorial conquest system

Personal currency consolidation

Ranged Combat

First round of Achievements

I’m hoping to start rolling out these updates in January. Upon completion of these I will release Xsyon from Early Access on Steam!

Public testing will commence in a week or two, starting with creature revisions, synchronization, animal taming and many minor improvements. The Test Server is currently open and will remain open while I run specific tests.

When I’m ready for public feedback, I will post in the Developer Zone.